Assesses Watts' claim by presenting an analysis of the extent of the diffusion of steam power in Jamaica between 1768, when James Watt made his first visit to Boulton's Soho Works near Birmingham and 1810, when the first Boulton and Watt engine arrived in the island's plantation economy. Through an examination of the early experimentation and uses of steam as a motive force in Jamaica, it is argued that the diffusion of steam power was well under way in the island before the advent of the Watt engine.....read more